By now everyone has been reminded that the media is not infallible. It is composed of very fallible human beings who make mistakes with the same regularity as all the rest of us. I was recently reading a bit about something in statistics called “Galton’s Problem,” an observational dynamic named after its discoverer, Sir Francis Galton.
To state it very crudely, Galton’s Problem is a situation resulting when observers assume that certain things are separate and discrete, when in fact they are not. For example, those who failed to predict Donald Trump’s electoral victory assumed that social conditions in the United States were isolated from those of the rest of the world. Such people failed to notice the evidence of widespread public anger in many other countries, most notably England, Italy, France, and Hungary.
Sir Francis Galton
Failure to take into consideration the “big picture” is still forgivable, of course; no one can be right all the time, or even most of the time. Systems in the modern world suffer from too much input and data, rather than too little. But deliberate lying is quite another matter. And it is undeniable that some mainstream media outlets have deliberately sought to conceal the truth on a variety of domestic and foreign issues. Rather than act as a check on governmental power, the media has actually become an arm of government power, enforcing doctrinal orthodoxy with a variety of carrots and sticks that have proven to be reasonably effective.
Individual journalists can play significant roles in this process. Consider a favorite example of mine, the case of famed baseball player Ty Cobb. I’ve been an admirer of Cobb for a very long time, ever since reading his autobiography as a boy. Something never quite felt true about all those stories that other biographers would tell about him. The worst of these was sports writer Al Stump, whose biography of Cobb has now been discredited as mostly fabrication.
Stump was granted exclusive access to Ty Cobb in 1960 and 1961 for his biographical purposes. Cobb shared with him many intimate details of his life and career; but instead of faithfully reproducing those recollections, Stump embellished, slanted, and outright fabricated numerous anecdotes designed to cast Cobb in the worst possible light. Stump portrayed Cobb as a southern racist (Cobb was from Georgia), a misogynist, and even a murderer. Cobb was not alive at the time all these stories began to circulate and was unable to defend himself.
To add insult to injury, Stump’s writings were used as the basis for a terrible 1994 film called Cobb, which starred Tommy Lee Jones. The film is a tissue of lies and distortions that deserved to—and did—flop at the box office. The real Ty Cobb was a complex, driven, and highly intelligent figure, who knew how to court controversy when he had to, but was actually a gentleman by the standards of the era. Readers interested in further reading should consult the wonderful biography by Charles Leerhsen entitled Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty.
A famous photo of Cobb stealing third base
To begin with, Cobb used brains rather than brawn to beat his opponents. He made careful studies of all the top players of his day and crafted strategies designed to exploit their weaknesses. For example, when he learned that pitcher Walter Johnson hated hitting batters with pitches, Cobb would crowd the plate to force Johnson to walk him. He learned how to get inside the heads of his adversaries, forcing them to lose their tempers; when they did, Cobb would steal bases right under their noses. He remains one of the few players in history who knew how to steal home base.
One legend about Cobb that has persisted is that he was a violent brawler. This is simply not true. It is true that men of his era got into fistfights often—it was part of a healthy masculine culture back then—but he never gratuitously assaulted or struck anyone. The few incidents that have been held out as examples of his misbehavior (e.g., a fight with a black groundskeeper and assorted hotel brawls) prove to be on closer inspection nothing more than the standard types of fights that physically-minded men like him became entangled with. Nearly all ballplayers of his era engaged in them, including Babe Ruth.
Al Stump’s character assassination of Cobb went even further, painting him as an unreconstructed southern “racist” who had a grudge against blacks. This is completely false. Cobb was actually one of the few early supporters of integration in the big leagues. When asked his opinion about subject by the Sporting News in 1952, he said, “The negro has the right to compete in sports, and who is to say he has not?”
He had nothing but compliments for black athletes like Willie Mays and Jackie Robinson, and players in the Negro League whom Cobb interacted with in the 1920s confirm that there was no trace of prejudice in Cobb’s makeup. Cobb mentored younger players, corresponded with fans with personalized letters, and helped found a hospital and a college education fund.
Cobb was certainly no angel, but in hindsight he was nothing more than an aggressive, daring man who played professional sports at a time when things were much less regulated than they are now. Cobb himself may even have allowed spurious tales about himself to circulate in order to court publicity. But he had a limit, and complete fairy tales he would not tolerate.
Stump’s lies have been so pervasive and persistent that the mythology surrounding Cobb will take decades to undo. If anything, Cobb was too trusting in letting a man like Stump into his confidence. Cobb was so angry with Stump’s hatchet job that he was preparing to sue to prevent publication of Stump’s writings in 1961, just before his death. The terrible 1994 film Cobb only added more oil to the fire.
Malicious journalism can do serious damage. Sometimes the damage comes from ignorance, other times from deliberate peddling of falsehood. The motives for lying—whether coming from money, fame, or the desire to “virtue signal”—can always be found if one digs below the surface. In the modern era, the default rule must be to seek independent confirmation of news stories, and to remember that journalists are subject to the same human emotions and weaknesses as all the rest of us.
Read More: An Examination Of Cult Leader Game
I’m so excited to make America great again. Can we declare lying public figures who promote weaponized SJW myths to be domestic terrorists now? At least freeze their bank accounts?
In my opinion, the best we can do is on the local level. What we say on social media does little compared to what we say to our friends and neighbors over a hand of cards.
100% agreement with this.
any type of (organised) “brigading” against a business or individual should be considered organised-crime (subject to RICO) or domestic terrorism.
Because it is.
especially once it starts getting funded….
And ALL proven false accusers of ‘rape’, ‘assault’, and ‘harassment’ serve a mandatory prison sentence of not less than ten years in a federal penitentiary, and pay restitution to the victim of their false accusation no less than ten thousand dollars!
“Don’t wanna do the time, or have to pay the fine, then don’t do the crime!”
I read an article by a journalist who, needless to say, is releasing another book on Trump. He relayed a host of stories from back in the ’90’s about Trump. Visiting him in Trump tower, flying down to Florida on Trumps jet. All the usual guff about Trump, he’s crass, loud, no taste, blah, blah. Nothing anyone hasn’t heard before. Oh and Trump isn’t worth as much as he says. These journos push the same old hackneyed articles and books over and over again. If Trump had been going around abusing women and treating people like shit for years there would have been an avalanche or accusations during the election. All that happened was an 11 year old tape of him pretty much saying “when you’re rich and famous women will LET you grab ’em by the pussy!” and a bunch of over the hill cat lady’s who sat beside him 30 years ago making allegations a few weeks before voting day!!!
They are hacks rehashing old news for libtards…….
“when you’re rich and famous women will LET you grab ’em by the pussy!”
Like any male over the age of fourteen didn’t know THAT already!
Great article! I’ve known Stump’s book was nothing more that a hit piece for years. Stump’s peers despised him. Maybe H’wood will make a flick about him that does him justice (yeah, right).
A great book that does justice to its subjects is “The Glory of Our Times.” I highly recommend it.
Cobb started a college fund for poor blacks and did many things for them as well as others. He was a hard competitor but was a decent guy and very intelligent.
so our glorious, fabulous leader has been shut down in Britain.
Milo/Bruno
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-11-21/british-governments-counter-extremist-unit-shuts-down-milo-yiannopoulos-speech
wait Milo is the leader? I always thought he was bringing up the rear
I thought he was too busy cruising up mustard alley to lead.
Come to think of it don’t want him leading me anywhere one way or another considering the fact that he’s literally (Hitler) a cocksucker.
You know, as hard as I try to parse it out I can’t figure out what mustard alley would be.
Me either but I always laughed every time I heard it anyway.
When faced with an unknown term that can’t immediately be reconciled, I find searching for images based on the term instructive, fast, and frequently unwise.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/9fd2563727f1f5d6c572031e63399c052a585f75ff3ae1b66b84c2342e4a572a.jpg
“cruising up mustard alley”
ho-ly shit – that might replace “The Brown Room” in my off-color commentary.
and every time, I regret it almost instantly…
Unwise indeed!
Isn’t “Mustard Alley” just off the “Hershey Highway”?
He’s a crafty butcher….. takes his meat in the rear……
He only eats dark meat, by the way.
That guy is gonna hit the wall pretty soon, methinks.
I don’t particularly care about him one way or another, except he has been able to make greater in-roads as he is a gay-jew-black-cocks-only-matter-cocksucker…He has been a vocal-anti-establishment – pointing out the hypocrisy and ludicrous policies of the universities.
The issue I’m pointing out is there is a “Counter-Extremist” Unit that is willing to ban the words of said gay-jew-bcm speaker…
I very much think we have the same in USA -surely have in Australia and Scandinavia…And may flip the ID on all users of these “Extremist” websites…
perhpas we should form a union – pay fees for legal defense budget
I’m not sure which wall you mean, but if it’s the “wall” commonly mentioned on this site then, at the risk of being “TMI”, the guy claims that he has 15 years before he hits the homo community’s equivalent.
The (((Media))) is losing their grip on power. The goyim used to believe what was told to them by their Jewish overlords in the 20th century. But now we know better! Trump’s election is proof of that!
Even sadder is the fact that Theodore Herzl sold out the Zionist movement to the British Crown from the very beginning, to the point that had to be done under the table, so that this fact would become lost forever.
Back on topic, I genuinely appreciate this article for actually taking the time to dig up truths about deceased people.
Ty Cobb’s legacy should be fixed, and this is a start.
“Back on topic, I genuinely appreciate this article for actually taking the time to dig up truths about deceased people”
Agreed. A similar article about Fatty Arbuckle ran here at ROK:
Unfortunately the majority are still plugged in. The ones looking to escape are usually misdirected back into their web.
Interesting. Over the last 20 years or so it seems that most main stream journalists/ authors/ Hollywood have spent a lot of time trying to tear down everything we ever thought about most all American heroes. Us old guys remember when men like George Washington, Ben Franklin,along with various early sports stars, veterans etc were men to be looked up to. Now they are being portrayed as evil oppressive slave masters or mad warlords and mean drunks while communists like MLK and Malcom X were superb human beings who could do no wrong. At times I wonder if we are going to be embarrassed to have a national MLK holiday after those classified FBI documents are released or are they going to be conveniently lost before being released? The left wing now even wants Columbus Day to be remade into indigenous peoples day.
I recently heard someone on television referring to some Japenese Americans having “survived” internment in American “concentration camps” in WW2. Yes it was kind of messed up that they were sent to camps but they try to make out like the US treated them
like the Nazis did the Jews, there’s no comparison. Also they’ve grown fond of portraying American troops as rapists and shooting prisoners in war movies to make America look bad. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it never happened but I will say when it did and they were caught there was a good chance they would face a firing squad.
“Us old guys remember when men like George Washington, Ben Franklin,along with various early sports stars, veterans etc were men to be looked up to.”
Yup. And you forgot the “champion marble shooter, the fastest runner, the big-league ball players and the toughest boxers”
Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser!
We’re going to murder those Hun bastards by the bushel!
” I am personally going to shoot that paper-hanging son-of-a-bitch Hitler.”
I always loved that line….not sure why Hitler was a “paper hanger” but then again I had no idea there was a champion marble shooter.
i didn’t either but if Patton said there was,then there was.
I know that Hitler was some sort of a painter when he was younger. Maybe that was the “paper hanging”?
Paperhanger=counterfeiter, bad check writer.
ha, I had never heard that. I consider myself well educated today and it isn’t even 9 am. Thanks!
No, actually Hitler was an aspiring artist in his youth — a painter of paintings. It’s an unproven story that he blamed a Jewish judge that panned his paintings, for him not being admitted into a prestigious art school.
The “Hitler was a paper hanger” (someone who made their living by hanging wallpaper) is believed to be one of the numerous wartime propaganda stories about him. There’s no historical proof that he ever made his living hanging wallpaper.
Actually as it was pointed out before “paper hanger was also slang at the time for con artists or people who passed bad checks” which makes a lot more sense in the context.
I heard too that Hitler was a paper hanger – but there is nothing documented that he actually worked as a housr painter or wall paper hanger. He was an artist made many watercolours tradition style. He was twice declined permission to attend art school in vienna because his work was not experimrntal enough.
Actually, the term “paper hanger” back then was colloquial for someone who wrote bad checks. When Patton calls him a “paper hanging son of a bitch” he means someone who writes checks and can’t cash them like today when we say “your mouth is writing checks that your body can’t cash”
Intereresting, thanks.
Wouldn’t it be swell if we could just remember people as actual human fukking beings? With all their faults and strengths, instead of as one-dimensional heroes and villains?
Have you ever read “Farewell to Mazanar”? It was written by a man who spent time in Japanese internment camp as a child – I had to teach the book when I worked in a high school years ago.
At any rate, the child (now a man) reflects back on what a pleasant experience Manzanar was: how the children played together, had a good time, etc. In short, it was no Auschwitz. He makes it sound like summer camp.
These leftist fucks need to be called out on everything. There is not one of their points that is not laced with butthurt revisionist history.
I haven’t read that book however when I began to hear more about the internment camps I read up on them some to see what it was all about. It was messed up that they took those people away from their homes but, they were treated as well as could be given the circumstances. It certainly was not a matter of “survival” as the left would have one believe.
Apparently there are few things leftist fucktards love more than revisionist history, you are correct they need calling out at every opportunity.
Agreed. It wasn’t a great situation, but it wasn’t the “hell on earth” we are lead to believe.
After 5 years I decided to leave my old work and it changed my life… I started doing work from home, for a company I stumbled upon online, several hrs every day, and I make much more than i did on my old work… My pay-check for last month was for Nine thousand dollars… Superb thing about it is the more free time i got for my kids… http://chilp.it/728813e
The victors write the history.
Japan deserved two nuked cities it wasn’t really a big deal.
The terror bombings of German civilians, refugees, emergency workers and supply lines that starved hundreds of thousands of Germans and German Jews didn’t happen. Mass rapes, killings and lootings of German cities by soviet and allied soldiers is a myth. Shrunken Jewish heads and Jewish skin lampshades aren’t talked about anymore but mass fire ovens and gassings are still very real. Laws have been made and enforced so all holocaust ‘facts’ are protected from scrutiny. After all, the honest truth should always be fearful of being investigated.
These Germans prison camps operating under new laws made specifically for the purpose “disarmed enemy forces” didn’t happen or are irrelevant ofcourse.
https://i2.wp.com/rense.com/1.imagesH/Real-(R)-1.jpg
They deserved two nuked city’s instead of us probably suffering a million plus military casualties by having to invade. The little bastards got exactly what they deserved. So did the Nazis. Japanese POWs were treated much better by us than the Japanese treated ours.
Now if you had read what I said instead of getting all emotional you would notice where I said the US wasn’t perfect.
Looting and rape was probably encouraged by the Soviets, however US troops faced prison time or firing squads for such activities.
I kind of agree with what Pattons position was on the Soviets-
“If you ask me, instead of disarming these Germans we should be getting them to help us fight the damn Bolsheviks. We are going to have fight them sooner or later anyway why don’t we do it now while we have an army here to do it with?”.
“instead of us probably suffering a million plus military casualties”
Not to mention the 10+ million projected Japanese casualties as it was expected that the Japanese citizenry would fight. Whenever some dumbshit talks about how evil we were to bomb the Japs with the A bombs, I tell them that every Purple Heart awarded today was made in preparation for the invasion of Japan.
You are correct an invasion would have been much worse than two atomic bombs.
I was a voracious reader of everything to do with World War II as a boy right up to the time when I left high school, so I was exposed to the historians writing about WW II (Ed Tregaskis, Martin Caidin, etc.) before everything that wasn’t P.C. ‘disappeared’ from the school curriculums and general knowledge.
Practically every historian then wrote that an invasion of Japan would have resulted in a bloodbath of unbelievable proportions, even taking in account the casualties that had already happened among the Japanese civilians and military forces and all Allied forces.
As far as Japanese society back then was organized and educated, the social rule was the code of Bushido, and therefore every civilian — men, women, and children — as well as every military service member was expected to fight to the death (including suicide attacks) to destroy any invading barbarian force.
Remember the Kamikaze pilots who crashed their planes into our ships? As horrifying as the concept was to our people, the Kamikazes (which were essentially guided missiles that were controlled by a human instead of a computer chip) were still an incredibly EFFECTIVE weapon, as they caused more death and destruction to our ships and their crews than practically any other kind of weapon in the Pacific Theater.
Well, our forces would have been facing Kamikaze and other suicide attacks of all kinds all of the time, by any Japanese of any sex or age. And surrendering was forbidden, a disgrace.
To cut this short: it was forseen by Western sociologists and our military experts that these attitudes of Japanese society — when faced with an invasion of their homeland — would result not just in the literal destruction of the country of Japan, it would quite possibly result in the extinction of Japanese culture and of the Japanese as a people.
So the dropping of the atom bombs (although a horrible choice — may it NEVER happen again!) actually SAVED the lives of literally millions of people — Allied as well as Japanese — and the Japanese country and culture.
Our military experts also informed us of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Perhaps we should have Nuked Baghdad to ‘save lives’ instead of invading, killing and destroying their country.
Did we end up finding those weapons? fuck it, terrorism, fighting the war on terror, lets run with that. As the victors we will write the history.
Agree 100% with the statement that Japan and Japanese people likely would not exist today had an invasion taken place. In later years, the threat of nuclear holocaust was what, in my opinion, kept the cold war cold. I hate it when nuclear weapons are demonized. I would feel comfortable asserting that nuclear weapons have done more to prevent war than any other weapon in human history.
Not fair to compare the two wars. If you think that the situations are even remotely similar than you are an idiot.
Ok genius.
In 50 years plus we will probably see people much like yourself labelling others ‘idiots’ for suggesting the invasion of Iraq for weapons of mass destruction was ill conceived.
They will espouse the bureaucratic assertion that will grace our history books that it was the most favorable decision of the time and (literally) Hitler Sadam had to be stopped. It saved Iraq as a nation and American lives etc etc…
Then why bring war on Iraq under the proviso of weapons of mass destruction.
Soral has a say for this (in Western countries, most) journalisst are whores or unemployed.
I’ve never known very many men in the journalism profession that one would describe to be manly men, even in sports. Most schools of journalism are housed in their respective university’s English Department and is on the far left wing even considering that academic institutions in general are left wing.
Cobb, like Trump with Billy Bush, would have been wise to keep a professional distance with Stump, instead of sharing his deepest darkest secrets with him as if he were a fellow male contemporary.
Good article; I’ll have to find a copy of the biography you mentioned. If you want another book that presents a counter-narrative to the slanders in Al Stump’s account then you might also enjoy “Heart of A Tiger” written by Cobb’s grandson, Herschel. He describes living with his grandfather during summers after his parents could no longer care for him (both were violent alcoholics) and ultimately credits Ty Cobb with both saving his life and being the father that he’d never been able to have.
My dad, who actually worked for the MLB, told me growing up Cobb sharpened his spikes. Even the coaches and managers repeated it. I’ve read since then it was a myth.
Thanks for the clarification on Ty Cobb!
Interesting read. FYI, Ty Cobb was a Freemason. As were Rogers Hornsby, Honus Wagner, and Cy Young, among others. While most sports are played on a rectagular fields (or ice rinks, in the case of hockey), baseball is played on a field which contains sacred geometry. The field, in alignment with the semi-circlular formation of the outfield walls, is a dead-ringer for the Masonic square and compass (see image below). The outfield grass is often mowed in such a way as to form a checkerboard pattern, which can be observed on the floors of Masonic lodges. The number 3 (or multiples of it), a sacred number in Masonry, plays a heavy role in the formulation of the game – 3 strikes per batter, 3 outs per inning, 9 players on the field, 9 innings per game, 27 outs per side in a 9-inning game, 81 home games, 81 games on the road (wink-wink…or should that be hoodwink-hoodwink).
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c1ad48cd36fefa5c5e25be1df9cbb3a4705b49c50e2dbe434820253a655ae042.jpg
The compass there looks more like strippers legs.
“Journalists” nowadays are more malicious than anything. Time to start publicly shaming them for their crap.
As for Cobb, I recall that he really had a negative view of how Babe Ruth was changing the old style low-scoring game to trying to get as many home runs as possible. Would be interesting to see more on that.
Agree that Ty Cobb has been grossly slandered.
I have always considered him the greatest baseball player of all time.
.367 lifetime average AND over 1900 career RBIs.
But I suppose the reason I have always admired him has to do with his background. He was severely hazed and bullied by his teammates when he first went to the Tigers. They made him mean, he struck back at them, and they hated him for it. His own teammates were very much against him, and he still kept going to be the greatest of all time. He did it his way.
Media is the information-world equivalent of AIDS.
There are no more journalists left. Most of the print media is saturated by freelancers who are paid to fill space for several publications and have tight deadlines and therefore no serious effort is made to check facts or investigate since deadlines are constant. The tv media is composed of seven figured salaried pseudo celebs who have agendas to push.
Rip journalism.
Thank You Quintus Curtius for this great column on a fascinating sports legend….I remember Reading the “My Life In Baseball” book In high school, and finding It a fascinating read just for the baseball stories alone….as I grew up and more was discovered about Ty Cobb’s legacy, I realized that I liked the baseball stories because they were probably the stories that ringed true to me….I love that Cobb would describe that he would be practicing how to lay down a perfect bunt so that the baseball could stop where the 3rd baseman & the pitcher would have maximum difficulty In trying to throw Cobb out for example….In Closing, I’m Thankful that Leerhsen’s book has come out, and I will definitely be checking it out when I have a chance, Thank You again!!!!
I knew his son.. real cool guy. He told me that most of what they said about his dad was BS….sounds like it was.
The same thing happened to 1920’s silent film star Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle. He was falsely accused of raping and killing (manslaughter) actress Virginia Rappe in 1921, and the newspapers made him out to be a monster. Although he was finaly acquitted, his reputation was ruined and he never was able to regain his good name and popularity.
White envy existed ever since Europeans kickstarted the Age of Exploration six centuries ago. The only difference was that non-whites and self-loathing caucasians feared whites until the 1960s and kept their issues to themselves. The attack on white celebrities like Cobb is part of the brazen propaganda propagated by the antagonists and their disturbed minions in bringing the west and whites down. As a conspiracy theorist it makes me wonder where all of this is headed and what kind of future will be in store for the whole planet.
Was stump part of the khazar Klub?
I can offer you a job tongue punching my fart box. Are you interested?